


in the stillness

by myeyesarenotblue



Series: Whumptober 2020 [2]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Angst, Blood and Violence, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Gun Violence, Hurt No Comfort, Minor Character Death, Whumptober 2020, another take on ben's death anyone?, no beta we die like ben
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:42:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26783101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myeyesarenotblue/pseuds/myeyesarenotblue
Summary: “I’m fucking sick of you freaks, you’re so fucking-” and then, he stops, he stops, twists his lips into a smile, something wretched, “Tell you what,” he says, looking at Luther in the eye, and his casual tone clashes against the horrible words that leave his mouth, “Pick who dies.”Time slows down.“What?”No 2. IN THE HANDS OF THE ENEMY“Pick Who Dies”| Collars | Kidnapped
Series: Whumptober 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1951162
Comments: 3
Kudos: 31
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	in the stillness

**Author's Note:**

> 😭 😭 😭 y'all i hate this one but whatever

There’s a mission. 

There’s a mission, and everything is perfectly normal because they are the Umbrella Academy after all, and there are always missions. Everything’s perfectly normal. 

It’s a bank robbery. 

It’s fine. 

It’s normal. 

Luther goes in first, signals the rest of his siblings to come in after making sure the coast is clear, and once they’re all inside they start dispersing. He puts Klaus on lookout duty, sends Allison and Ben to scout the perimeter, figure out where the hell the hostages are being held. 

Then it’s just him, and Diego, and they split in opposite directions, searching for the thieves they were promised. 

It’s fine. 

It’s normal. 

They’re not even fifteen minutes in when things start getting ugly. 

The thing is- 

The thing is, they’ve been in the public eye since they were thirteen-years-old. They don’t really hide their faces, or their names, or their respective abilities. 

Criminals learn. 

Year, after year, after year, it seems criminals learn to expect them, to prepare for them, to figure out every single little detail that they can about them. They really haven’t been able to rely on the element of surprise in a pretty good while. 

The first goon Luther runs into is covered head to toe in black kevlar, which means Diego’s knives are going to be _completely_ useless in this one mission. 

And it’s- fine. 

It’s annoying mostly, but Diego’s good at hand to hand and Luther’s pretty sure he’s not going to let a bullet proof vest stop him. Still, he starts feeling uneasy, gets a weird feeling low in his stomach, because- really, if they prepared for Diego, then who the hell knows what else they prepared for? 

The goon, as expected, charges towards him. 

But it’s whatever. 

Luther’s got superstrength. 

He deals with him, keeps marching forward. 

The bank has marble floors that look disturbingly similar to the ones back at home, and Luther keeps getting distracted whenever he catches sight of them. Between that, and the wood panels, and the occasional gold light fixture, he feels right at home. 

And that’s- 

Not particularly a good thing. 

It makes him jittery, makes him a little nervous. 

It’s eerily silent, too, just like home. 

The only sound he can hear is the squelch of his own shoes, his breathing, slightly agitated. 

It puts him on edge, the thought that _something bad_ is supposed to be happening but there’s nothing at all. They were told there was an active robbery in place but he can’t spot a single robber save from that one guy he got rid of, and there are no other people, either, no hostages, no stray civilians waiting things out. 

He keeps walking. 

He keeps walking, and he keeps walking, and he keeps walking. 

He starts edging and edging towards the back of the bank, a maze of hallways and strange little rooms. Everywhere he looks, everything’s deserted, until- 

Until it isn’t. 

Luther takes a sharp left, walks into a random room, and thinks _oh_ , oh there they are. 

The robbers. 

The hostages. 

Three men, all black kevlar, guns the size of their heads nestled a little too comfortably in their arms, pacing the room, walking left and right. 

At least a dozen hostages. 

It just doesn’t look good. 

Luther’s likes to think he’s got enough experience to be able to tell when someone’s just waving a gun around for the sake of it and won’t likely use it, and- to tell when they will, when it’s just a matter of _waiting_ , and _waiting_ , and doing their best, and fervently hoping the casualties will be kept to a minimum. 

It’s something about the way they stand, he thinks, about the way they carry themselves. 

These men are not afraid to spill some blood. 

And- 

If it wasn’t bad enough already- 

Between it all, Allison. 

Between it all, Ben. 

And, oh, they truly did prepare for them. 

They’ve got Allison with tape over her mouth- around her entire head, really. Sticky gray holding her jaw still, going around her lips and her cheeks and her hair, a job messily done, probably while she struggled and tried her best to squirm away. 

It’s gonna be stupidly painful to remove. 

Then Ben. Innocuously sitting. No restraints. No tape. No anything. But he’s immobilized all the same, unable to use his one strength against the robbers. 

They’ve got him sitting right in the middle of the hostages. 

If he were to release the Horror, they’d all be dead in a matter of seconds. 

So- 

No rumors, no eldritch. 

It’s- 

It’s fine. 

It’s fine. 

It’s not ideal, but it's fine. 

Luther takes a breath, waits to be spotted. 

It happens easily. 

He can see that Ben and Allison spot him the second he walks through the door, but they don’t really do anything. That’s good. Best not to make any sudden movements. 

Then it’s one of the goons, freezing where he stands, “Hey!” he barks, and his gun is suddenly pointed towards him. 

But that’s fine. 

Luther was expecting that. 

The others point their guns, too, and then it’s a standoff, Luther against the three men, the three guns. He remains stoic. He does not make a single move. 

“Which one is it?” 

“The strong one. I think.” 

“Don’t let ‘im get close then.” 

They know who he is. 

They know to use his strength against him. 

It’s fine. 

It’s fine, really. 

“Gentlemen,” Luther says, his voice carefully level, “I’m afraid I don’t like what you’ve got going on here. I’m gonna have to ask you to let these people go.” 

He receives a snort in response. 

“Not happening.” 

They stare at each other for a long, long time. 

Enough time that Luther thinks maybe they’re put at ease, maybe they won’t see him as such a blatant threat, maybe he can make a move, _maybe, maybe, maybe-_

He takes a step forward. 

_“Hey!”_

He takes another step. 

_“Stop moving!”_

He takes another step. 

_“You fucking- fucking stop moving!”_

He takes another step. 

_“I said stop, damnit!”_

And- 

One of the men, the one closest to the hostages- 

_“Stop! Stop! Fucking-”_

He sounds desperate, he sounds willing to do just about anything. Luther keeps getting closer and the man keeps stepping back, and he’s waving his stupid gun around like it’s some toy or something, and he’s not shooting _Luther_ , so that’s good, but then- 

He turns around and puts a bullet in between a hostage’s eyes. 

Just like that. 

Blood and brains and bits of gore go flying, splattering all over the walls and the floors and- on Ben, on Ben’s face, and his chest, and his hair, and his eyes, and his mouth. 

Ben takes a sharp breath, snaps his eyes shut. 

There’s a wave of reactions from the hostages, whines, and cries, and disgruntled sounds, and Allison snaps her eyes shut as well, looks away. 

Luther doesn’t look away. 

He can’t look away. 

He can tell the man who fired grows agitated, holds the gun impossibly tighter, gains a crazed edge. 

The blood is strikingly bright. 

Luther can’t look away. 

“Step back,” the man barks at him, gesturing with his gun. 

Luther doesn’t really move. 

He- 

He doesn’t really handle it all that well, every time someone dies in front of him. It doesn’t matter how many times it’s happened, how many times he tries to convince himself he did all he could do and the one to blame is not him but the one who pulled the trigger. 

It’s still a life lost. On his watch. 

It’s still his fault. 

“Step back,” the man repeats, louder this time, and another one of them takes it as his cue to all but throw himself at Luther, to try and- tackle him or something, restrain him, and Luther- 

Well, they did warn the guy not to get close. 

He’s got superstrength. 

He pushes at the man’s shoulder, twists his arm until he’s dropped his own gun, kicks at him, pushes him _down_ , makes sure he stays _down_ , and- 

_“Hey, hey, hey!”_

It’s the other guy. 

And Luther thinks he can probably reach him if he moves fast enough, but then there’s also the _other_ guy to worry about, and- 

And suddenly- 

Suddenly- 

Suddenly that man, the trigger happy one- 

He reaches for Allison. 

He grabs a fistful of her hair and tugs harshly, pulls her towards himself, and she _whimpers_ , and she’s got tape over her mouth but her whimper is _stupidly_ loud, anyway, crystal clear, and the man holds her close with one hand, pushes his gun against her temple with the other one. 

_Luther freezes._

The man laughs. 

He laughs, and he laughs, and he laughs, “So _that_ gets you to slow down, huh?” 

Luther doesn’t like the way that man is holding his sister, the way he’s holding that gun. 

There’s blood all the room, there’s chopped up meat, a cooling body. There’s Ben, splattered with sticky warm red, his eyes open wide, his hands balled into fists, shaking minutely. 

Luther doesn’t like the way that man is holding his sister. 

“Let her go,” he says, barely a whisper. 

“What was that?” 

“Let- let her go, you don’t know what you’re doing.” 

The man considers him, “How about you walk away and I’ll think about it?” 

But Luther shakes his head, “I- no, no, I can’t do that.” 

“You sure?” the man barks, and then he’s yanking forcefully at Allison’s hair all over again, and- 

And Allison doesn’t make a single sound this one time. 

She just stares right at him, her brown eyes full of something heavy. 

“S-Stop!” Luther says, and he’s _stuttering_ , and he _doesn’t_ know what to do, and he ends up searching for Ben, and Ben’s not really in a vantage point at the moment, either, in between civilians, unable to use his power, but he ends up searching for him all the same, _desperately_ , _urgently_ , “Ben-” he starts, but then- 

“Oh, no,” the man says, and he smiles big, all teeth, “No, no, no,” then he’s- walking towards Ben, five short steps, and he’s dragging Allison with him by the hair, and he’s stepping over the dead body like its nothing, and he’s pushing past the civilians without a care in the world. He looks at Ben in the eye, lifts his chin up with the barrel of the gun. “You’re not gonna try anything funny, are you?” 

And Ben shakes his head side to side, sits painfully still. 

“Leave him alone,” Luther says, and he’s taking a step forward without really meaning to. 

“Stay where you are!” the man barks, waving that damned gun around, “Don’t fucking move or I’ll fucking blow his brains out!” 

And- 

God, god, god, Luther does stumble to a halt, he does, he _absolutely_ does, but the momentum of his previous steps throw him forward, leaves moving still, for another second or two. 

“Alright, that’s it,” the man says, and he raises his gun, pushes it into Ben’s forehead with enough force to send him tumbling backwards and scrambling to lean on his elbows to try and straighten up, and the man goes to push the trigger, but- 

“No!” Luther yells, at the exact same time that Allison squeals something out as well, unintelligible, a jumble of words. 

“No what?” the man barks, “I’m fucking sick of you freaks, you’re so fucking-” and then, he stops. He stops, twists his lips into a smile, something wretched. “Tell you what,” he says, looking at Luther in the eye, and his casual tone clashes against the horrible words that leave his mouth, “Pick who dies.” 

Time slows down. 

“What?” 

The man looks stupidly smug, amused, like he’s _enjoying_ this, “Pretty boy or pretty girl,” he says, gesturing at Ben and Allison respectively, “One of ‘em is dying. Your pick.” 

That’s more or less the moment in which Luther realizes if he doesn’t play his cards right, they’re not all coming out of this room in one piece. 

He likes to think he’s got enough experience to be able to tell when a person’s just spitting out threats for the sake of it and won’t go through with them, and- 

To be able to tell when he’s genuinely being asked to choose between the lives of his brother, or his sister. Two of the people he loves most in the entire goddamned planet. 

This guy- 

He seems the type that wants an answer. 

Seems the type that wants pain, that revels on it, that won’t stop until he’s made his victim suffer. 

And- 

Luther realizes, with a petrifying panic, he’s the victim here, in this scenario. 

He’s the one who interrupted whatever the hell these goons where about to do, he’s the one who made them mad, made them angry, he’s the one this man in front of him is placing all of his wrath in and now he wants to make him pay, to make him suffer, and the way he’s gonna do it is not by hurting him, but by hurting his siblings. 

“Take your pick.” 

Luther takes a breath, shaky, unmeasured. “Why- why don’t we calm down for a second? There’s no reason to-” 

“I’m not repeating myself,” the man hisses, angry, angry, angry, “Take your _fucking_ pick already,” and- 

And his grip on Allison’s hair tightens, and he pulls at her hair, nearly lifts her off the floor by her hair, and she cries out, and she whimpers, and- 

“Shit, Allison,” Luther blurts, going to step forward but not daring to. 

And the goon smiles, “Ah, this one?” 

And suddenly the gun’s right by her head and- 

Luther realizes, horrified, that he said her name, that this man asked him which one of siblings to murder on cold blood and he said her name, “No,” he says, now, sharply, urgently, “No, no, no, that’s not what I-” 

And the man stares at him, and- 

His smile. 

His smile is the stuff of nightmares. 

“The other one, then,” he says, letting go of Allison, dropping her down like a ragdoll, “Good to know,” and then- 

In the blink of an eye, he turns around and he shoots Ben in the chest. 

Just like that. 

Bullet, after bullet, after bullet. 

Three times. 

It’s funny, but- in the blink of eye, _in the blink of an eye_ , Luther has enough time to understand exactly what’s going to happen and why, he’s got enough time to understand it’s _going_ to happen, whether he wants it or not, and it’s _going_ to be his fault, always. 

He manages to catch Ben’s eye right before it happens, see panic and understanding sweeping his factions, turning his expression into something devoid of emotions, numb, something reigned by fear and nothing else. 

“Luther,” Ben mouths, right before the first bullet hits him. 

He drops down hard against the marble, and Allison screams. 

The thing hits him front and center, and they’ve all taken enough anatomy lessons to understand there’s no coming back from that, but still, in the blink of an eye, Luther gets the urge to kneel down by his side, to push at his wound, to keep him _alive_ \- 

And Ben gurgles, and coughs up blood, and chokes out a pained noise, and- 

And another bullet hits him. 

And then another. 

And then- 

He stops moving. 

He just stops moving, stops breathing, too. 

Times slows down. 

Time stops existing. 

The man with the gun starts laughing hysterically, mad cackles echoing all around them. 

Then Allison’s starts screaming and doesn't stop, her cries intertwined with sobs, and Luther has the distant thought that maybe she should try and avoid crying with the way her mouth is covered. Doesn’t she know she could choke to death like that? 

Times slows down. 

Time stops existing. 

Ben’s not moving. Ben’s not breathing. 

There’s blood pooling around him, a sea of red. 

Ben’s- 

Ben’s dead. 

Ben’s dead. 

_(“Pick who dies.”)_

Luther took his pick, didn’t he? 

Luther was a bad leader, and a worse brother, and he couldn’t handle a simple mission, couldn’t handle that responsibility, that _duty_ , to keep his family. 

It’s- 

It was a simple question, wasn’t it? 

Pick who dies. 

He should've said _me_ , should’ve said _me, me, leave my sister alone, leave my brother alone,_ should’ve said, should’ve begged, _kill me, let them leave, kill me, please._

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on tumblr [@myeyesarenotblue](https://myeyesarenotblue.tumblr.com/)


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